Bewitched Again

Starting in 1996, U.S. television saw an influx of superhuman female characters who could materialize objects like Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, defeat evil like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and have premonitions like Charmed’s Phoebe. The extraordinary abilities of these women showed resistance to traditional gender roles, although these characters experienced infringements on their abilities in ways superpowered men did not. Supernaturally powerful women and girls have remained on television, including the heavenly connected Grace (of Saving Grace), telepathic Sookie (of True Blood), and magical Cassie (of The Secret Circle). These more recent characters also face numerous constraints on their powers. As a result, superpowers become a narrative technique to diminish these characters, a technique that began with television’s first superpowered woman, Samantha (of Bewitched). They all illustrate a paradox of women’s power: are these characters ever truly powerful, much less superpowerful, if they cannot use their abilities fully? The superwoman has endured as a metaphor for women trying to “have it all”; therefore, the travails of these television examples parallel those of their off-screen counterparts.

Starting in 1996, U.S. television saw an influx of superhuman female characters who could materialize objects like Sabrina, the Teenage Witch, defeat evil like Buffy the Vampire Slayer and have premonitions like Charmed's Phoebe. The extraordinary abilities of these women showed resistance to traditional gender roles, although these characters experienced infringements on their abilities in ways superpowered men did not. Supernaturally powerful women and girls have remained on television, including the heavenly connected Grace (of Saving Grace), telepathic Sookie (of True Blood), and magical Cassie (of The Secret Circle). These more recent characters also face numerous constraints on their powers. As a result, superpowers become a narrative technique to diminish these characters, a technique that began with television's first superpowered woman, Samantha (of Bewitched). They all illustrate a paradox of women's power: are these characters ever truly powerful, much less superpowerful, if they cannot use their abilities fully? The superwoman has endured as a metaphor for women trying to "have it all"; therefore, the travails of these television examples parallel those of their off-screen counterparts.

Imagine being so close to one of the characters in the Bewitched television series that you could twitch her nose. In Bewitched and Beyond: The Fan Who Came to Dinner, author Mark Wood shares his fifteen years of laughter, tears, and off-beat yet festive moments that he enjoyed with Kasey Rogers, who portrayed Louise Tate on the Bewitched series (1964-1972) that starred Elizabeth Montgomery, Dick York, Dick Sargent, Agnes Moorehead, Maurice Evans, David White, Erin Murphy, George Tobias, and Alice Pearce, among others. Each chapter explores a Bewitched episode in which Kasey appeared and the exploits Mark and their friends took pleasure in along with her. Together, they journeyed through her battles with about launching a Bewitched spin-off series, as well as Kasey’s several battles with throat and breast cancer. Mark remembers, “In my early twenties, I knew that I wasn’t overly good-looking and I wasn’t built like a Greek god, but I was funny. I knew that if I was ever going to make it in Hollywood I’d better have a good story. So, enter my favorite TV show of all time—Bewitched. Some may remember that Samantha and Darrin had a son, as well as a daughter, and his name was “Adam.” With that, I realized two more things: I looked like the love child of both Darrins and I could twitch my nose. Bingo, a sure thing! Wrong. However, because of my persistence, I became friends with many of the remaining cast members and their friends, but most especially, Kasey. She was the most amazing person I had ever met. She was so much more than her roles as “Louise Tate” or as “Miriam” in Alfred Hitchcock’s Strangers On A Train (1951); she was a talented writer, a beauty who had two separate Hollywood careers under two separate names, and she was the creator of Women’s Motocross. Her friends became my friends, and I soon realized I was not in Bewitched but living what felt like an odd episode for the next fifteen wonderful years . . . complete with magic and sound effects.” 33 chapters. 208 pages. Available in paperback and Kindle editions. Forewords by Bernard Fox (who played Dr. Bombay on Bewitched) and Rose Marie (who played Sally Rogers on The Dick Van Dyke Show). The book also includes an Index plus many never before seen photographs from Bewitched, as well as personal pictures of the stars through the years when Mark knew them. About the author: Mark Wood is the co-author of five other books, including The Bewitched Cookbook: Magic in the Kitchen.

Having given the evidence for William Shakespeare's Catholicism in two previous books, literary biographer Joseph Pearce turns his attention in this work to the Bard's most famous play, Romeo and Juliet. "Star-crossed" Romeo and Juliet are Shakespeare's most famous lovers and perhaps the most well-known lovers in literary history. Though the young pair has been held up as a romantic ideal, the play is a tragedy, ending in death. What then, asks Pearce, is Shakespeare saying about his protagonists? Are they the hapless victims of fate, or are they partly to blame for their deaths? Is their love the "real thing", or is it self-indulgent passion? And what about the adults in their lives? Did they give the young people the example and guidance that they needed? The Catholic understanding of sexual desire, and its need to be ruled by reason, is on display in Romeo and Juliet, argues Pearce. The play is not a paean to romance but a cautionary tale about the naïveté and folly of youthful infatuation and the disastrous consequences of poor parenting. The well-known characters and their oft-quoted lines are rich in symbolic meaning that points us in the direction of the age-old wisdom of the Church. Although such a reading of Romeo and Juliet is countercultural in an age that glorifies the heedless and headless heart of young love, Pearce makes his case through a meticulous engagement with Shakespeare and his age and with the text of the play itself.

The recent fascination in Finnish folklore studies with popular thought and the values and emotions encoded in oral tradition began with the realisation that the vast collections of the Finnish folklore archives still have much to offer the modern-day researcher. These archive materials were not only collected by scholars, but also by the ordinary rural populace interested in their own traditions, by performers and their audiences. With its myriad voices, this body of source material thus provides new avenues for the researcher seeking to penetrate popular thought. What does oral tradition tell us about the way its performers think and feel? What sorts of beliefs and ideas are transmitted in traditional songs and narratives? Perspectives from the study of mentalities and cultural cognition research provide a framework for investigating these issues. This collection of articles works from the premise that the cultural models which shape mentalities give rise to manifest expressions of culture, including folklore. These models also become embedded in the representations appearing in folklore, and are handed down from one generation to the next. The topics of the book cover age-old myths and world views, concepts of witchcraft and the Devil stretching back to the Middle Ages, and the values and collective emotions of Finnish and Hungarian agrarian communities.

The Frozen Deep is a story of a love triangle between Clara, Frank and Richard, spiced up with dangerous expeditions, mysterious visions and life-threatening circumstances. The end is as surprising and unexpected as we are (or are not) accustomed to in Collins' books.